Excerpted from the book Troy's
One Hundred Years 1789-1889 Published in 1891 by William H. Young,
7 and 9 First Street, Troy, NY

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The rescue
of Charles Nalle, an escaped slave from Virginia, arrested in
Troy under the provisions of the Fugitive Slave Act, on Friday,
April 27th, 1860, was intensely exciting and courageously accomplished.
The indiscreet runaway having told the circumstances of his
flight from his master's plantation in October, 1858, a lawyer
living at Sand Lake transmitted the information to the owner
of the fugitive. The necessary papers for the arrest of Nalle,
who had been hired as a coachman by Uri Gilbert, were place
in the hands of J. L. Holmes, United States Deputy Marshal.
The latter "executed the warrant and conducted the hand-cuffed
man to the office of Miles Beach, United States Commissioner,
on the second floor of the Mutual Bank Building, on the north-east
corner of First and State streets. William Henry, a colored
man, a friend of the prisoner, having heard of his arrest, secured
the legal services of Martin I. Townsend, and went with him
to the office of the United States Commissioner. Finding that
a decision adverse to Nalle's freedom had been rendered, Martin
I. Townsend immediately drew the papers necessary to obtain
a writ of habeas corpus to take the fugitive before the Hon.
George Gould, a justice of the Supreme Court.

report
of the arrest attracted a crowd of interested citizens to the
State Street sidewalk, on the south side of the Mutual Bank
Building, - not a few being colored people. To
acquaint them with the proceedings, William Henry began relating
the particulars of the arrest and trial. He feelingly described
how Nalle had been handcuffed and brought there as a criminal,
not for a crime but for his poverty in not owning his own body,
and told how he had been condemned and placed in the hands of
an officer to be conveyed, shackled and distressed, to a southern
plantation where he would again be a defenseless victim of cruelty
and despair. He asked his excited hearers whether they were
willing to permit this innocent and intelligent man to be deprived
of his rightful freedom and the blessings of liberty which they
so highly enjoyed. Meanwhile the evidences of a hastily formed
purpose to rescue the prisoner rapidly multiplied. A number
of colored men pressed themselves into the thronged room where
Nalle was waiting the service of the papers for a writ of habeas
corpus. The State Street stairway and hall were filled with
the eager friends of the fugitive. An old colored woman took
a conspicuous position at the window overlooking State Street.
The police of the city under the command of Timothy Quinn, chief
of the force, were ordered to preserve the peace and to quell
any disturbance about the building. At four o'clock, in the
afternoon, the papers were served; Marshal Holmes being directed
to bring the body of the prisoner before Judge Gould at his
office, No. 39 Congress Street. While Chief Quinn was descending
the stairs closely followed by Nalle, coatless and bare-headed,
- Marshal Holmes walking on one side of him and Morgan S. Upham,
deputy sheriff, on the other, - the old colored woman at the
hall-window gave the preconcerted signal

"The
scene became instantaneously one of great excitement," as
the Troy Daily Times related. "The moment the officers reached
the sidewalk, they were surrounded by the crowd, the inner-circle
of which was composed of resolute colored men who at once began
a vigorous attempt to rescue the prisoner. The city policemen
were soon separated from the other officers, and left fighting
promiscuously in the midst of a crowd perhaps of two thousand
persons, who were swaying to and fro like billows, shouting, laughing,
swearing, and fighting. Near the corner of State and First streets,
Deputy Upham was torn from the prisoner, while Marshal Holmes
was allowed by mistake to proceed with the prisoner as far as
Congress Street. The rescuers, perceiving that the prisoner was
not with Deputy Upham, overtook Marshal Holmes, who had him in
charge, when the fight was renewed with much bitterness. At this
juncture, the most conspicuous person was the old colored woman
who was continually exclaiming, "Give us liberty or give
us death," and with vehement gesticulations urging on the
rescuers. Here the scene became intensely exciting. Revolvers
were drawn, knives brandished, colored women rushed into the thickest
of the fray, the venerable Moll Pitcher of the occasion was fighting
like a demon, and the friends of Nalle closing upon the officers,
fearless and unterrified. The Deputy and Marshal, maimed by blows
from clubs, chisels, and other weapons, were forced to abandon
the prisoner; and shortly afterward Chief Quinn was also compelled
to releases his hold upon Nalle. Then two picked men seized the
prisoner, and ran down with him to the foot of Washington Street,
where Nalle jumped upon the ferry-boat and was carried over to
West Troy*. On his arrival on the opposite
side of the river, Nalle started to run up Broadway, but was soon
captured and taken up into the second story of a brick building,
near the ferry dock. Ten minutes had hardly elapsed before the
steam ferry-boat, which had been taken by storm, landed about
three hundred of the rescuers at West Troy, among them the ubiquitous
Moll Pitcher. The building was stoned, and the crowd, rushing
up into the room under a fire from the revolvers of the West Troy
officers, seized the prisoner and escaped with him from the building.
Nalle, with his devoted friends, fled down Broadway, closely followed
by the crowd, and when near the Arsenal wall, was placed in a
wagon and driven off westward on the Shaker Road. Thus ended the
rescue."

Nalle,
having been concealed for a time in the woods near Niskayuna, went
then to Amsterdam, where he remained until May, when, by subscriptions
of Uri Gilbert and other citizens of Troy, his freedom was purchased
for $650, and he again returned to Troy. *
Note: The City of Watervliet was formerly known as West Troy.